“Oh, rot!” contradicted Howarth, who was a married man.
“Régime du cotillon . . . petticoat Government, eh?” Turner laughed. Both he and Sullivan had evaded the snares of feminine hunters. “I don’t know the lady, but take it that she, also, is easy on the eye.”
Sullivan shook his great white head. Mrs. Pratt, he explained, had not been born to adorn life, but to emphasise it. Nature, in her wisdom, had given to some women determination, and the callousness that must accompany it.
“Purposeful,” said Mr. Sullivan, “grimly purposeful, with about as much sensitiveness as you would find in a piece of rock crystal. She’s got her mind set on having Gus in Parliament, and if Queen Victoria and her attendant lion got off the pedestal outside there, they wouldn’t be able to prevent her. She would repeal the B.N.A. Act if it stood in her way. A very useful woman,” he repeated, and insinuated himself into his overcoat.
“What’s he up to?” Howarth asked his companion as they bent their steps towards the restaurant and dinner.
“God knows!” answered Turner. “But there’s a load taken off my mind by the knowledge that he’s got something up his sleeve. And it won’t be all laughter either, if I know him.”
Howarth paused in the corridor. His dulled conscience was trying to shake off its political opiate and prompt him to play the man in this thing, but its small voice was speedily hushed by the animated scene about him. Pages were scurrying around; Members, released from the tension of debate, were greeting each other noisily; the omnium gatherum of the Galleries was debouching upon the Main lobby, so that the very air he breathed was vibrant with a scherzo of human voices.
“I say,” he cried, “let’s ask Dilling to feed with us. Under the intoxication of triumph, he may loosen up a bit—become loquacious. You get a table. I’ll get him!”
CHAPTER 5.
“It isn’t the thing, my dear!” Or, “It’s quite the thing, you know!”